Reserve Basing Statement Clarification

Lord Hammond of Runnymede Excerpts

Thursday 4th July 2013 Written Statements

[The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr Philip Hammond)]

Further to my announcement of 3 July about Reserves Forces and my associated written ministerial statement, Official Report, column 49WS, about “Army Reserve (Structure and Basing)” I wish to clarify three points:

Kilmarnock is an existing Defence site and was included in the baseline of current Army Reserve sites in calculating the numbers of sites referred to in my statement. It will, in future, be occupied as an Army Reserve site. Arguably, we could have included it as a “new” site and reduced the baseline by one. The outcome is the same; that Scotland will have 46 Army Reserve sites in the future.

With regard to my answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Vale of Glamorgan (Alun Cairns), 3 July 2013, Official Report, column 944, I can confirm that there will be a Royal Naval Reserve presence at Barry and in Cardiff.

Finally for clarity, in relation to my response to the hon. Member for Dudley North, (Ian Austin), 3 July 2013, Official Report, column 939, regarding the Royal Mercian and Lancastrian Yeomanry, I can advise the House that, in addition to the regimental headquarters, to be known as the Scottish and North Irish Yeomanry, there will also be a new headquarters squadron formed in Edinburgh; it is proposed that this is named HQ (Lothians and Border Horse) Squadron.